Blog
Emancipate NC Stands In Solidarity with the Family and Community of Daniel Turcios
Image courtesy of WUNC and Jason DeBruyn. It depicts Kerwin Pittman addressing reporters, as Dawn Blagrove and Ivan Almonte comfort Rosa Jerez, the wife of Daniel Turcios. Last week, the Raleigh Police Department needleessly murdered another civilian–this time, a...
Calling Incarcerated Artists!
Image depicts artwork by Emancipate NC client, Ashlee Inscoe. Calling all incarcerated artists! Inspired by the creativity and resilience of our siblings in jail and prison, Emancipate NC will launch a site to showcase the talent of incarcerated artists....
Emancipate NC Prepares Petition to Release DPD Body Cam
Image depicts Dawn Blagrove with William and Kim Smith at the Durham Police Department awaiting release of body camera footage. Emancipate NC has prepared a petition to publicly release body camera footage from an aggressive police action by the Durham...
Emancipate NC Raises a Billboard in Elizabeth City
Image depicts Kerwin Pittman underneath a new billboard in Elizabeth City, North Carolina, dedicated to the life and memory of Andrew Brown, Jr. Emancipate NC has raised a billboard in Elizabeth City, North Carolina to honor the life and memory of Andrew...
Dawn Blagrove Argues at NC Supreme Court
As previously reported, Executive Director Dawn Blagrove was invited to give oral argument in a Juvenile Life-without-Parole case at the North Carolina Supreme Court last month, after Emancipate NC submitted an amicus brief on behalf...
Emancipate NC & Team File Suit For Prison Censorship
In recent years, North Carolina prison officials have systematically violated the First Amendment by censoring publications mailed to incarcerated people, including the popular magazine, Prison Legal News. Thousands of incarcerated people across the country rely...
Biden’s Team Comes to NC: We Respond
CHARLOTTE — Emancipate North Carolina, and the North Carolina Black & Brown Policy Network released the following statement ahead of Vice President Kamala Harris and Secretary of Transportation Pete Buttigieg visiting North Carolina tomorrow: “In...
Emancipate NC Debates Police Reform
Emancipate NC’s Kerwin Pittman was featured in a televised debate on police reform at Wake Technical Community College last week. He was joined by Senator Amy Scott Galey (R, Alamance), Senator Mejtaba Mohammed (D, Mecklenburg),...
Emancipate NC Goes to the NC Supreme Court
Earlier this year, Emancipate NC submitted an amicus brief, authored by Dawn Blagrove and Ian Mance, to educate the North Carolina Supreme Court about the racial justice consequences of Juvenile Life Without Parole. On Wednesday,...
Lester Kearney’s Family Speaks
Photo depicts Lester Kearney's family, along with Advocate Cierra Cobb, outside of the Warren County Courthouse in October 2021. Lester Kearney is an innocent Black man facing the death penalty in Warren County, North Carolina for the 2018 murder of an elderly white...
Abolish Solitary Confinement Already
Personal commentary by Elizabeth Simpson If it wasn’t heartbreaking, it would be funny. Two weeks ago, the North Carolina Department of Public Safety, through its unironically named research unit, the “Innovation Institute,” concluded: there is a body of...
Victory In Alamance County!
Artwork by Dawn Blagrove Last week, we reported that Dawn Blagrove appeared in court in Alamance County to represent two witnesses who had been threatened with subpoenas and motions to compel after they offered truthful testimony regarding the racist statements of a...
Attorney General Concedes Need for Hearing in Case Tainted by Jury Discrimination
Earlier this year, Emancipate NC published an Open Letter to Josh Stein, North Carolina’s Attorney General, challenging his first-term record on criminal appeals. Our letter observed that in too many criminal cases, “Stein’s positions and arguments have been...
Emancipate NC Joins Anti-Confederate Monument Tour
Last week, Kerwin Pittman joined the ACLU of North Carolina and Durham Community Bail Fund on a tour of Confederate monuments in front of North Carolina’s county courthouses. The tour criss-crossed the State of North Carolina to see so many of these reminders of the...
Protest Defense Update
Photo was taken by Associate Director Elizabeth Simpson while legal observing in Raleigh, North Carolina on May 30, 2020. It has been more than a year since the summer of BLM protests that rocked North Carolina, demanding righteous and transformative change to the...